This week, Lauren read Twinkle Twinkle by Kaori Ekuni:"By far, my favorite of the year. Shoko and Mutsuki entered their first year of marriage as a sham. Mutsuki is gay and Shoko is emotionally unstable, unable to open up to another person in love. What begins as a false marriage changes with the influence of Kon, Mutsuki's lover. Throughout the story Kon becomes a more important part of the their lives. It's a story about learning to love and share with a person, to have a marriage even if there will never be any sex. By the end Kon, Shoko and Mutsuki find true love and commitment in a very unconventional relationship.

We had a little earthquake this morning here in Maryland.George Kispert, principal of Northeast High School, was observing a math class at the time of the tremor. He said he assumed it was someone moving furniture.

This week Lauren read Krachmacher by Jim Campbell: "3 stories in one fabulous book. In this comic we meet Marianne, a college student that feels isolated, even within her group of friends. There's a quick story in the middle of an old man that saves the world from robots. Short and sweet. The last story is about a man and pork roast. This leads to my favorite panel: Pork Roast leaning against a brick wall smoking a cigarette, looking very tough.

The stories are great but the art is spectacular. The colors are amazing, the feel is very realistic. This is one to pick up."

Rachel read So Yesterday by Scott Westerfeld:"There's something about getting sick that makes me want to regress a bit, and reading a YA novel was just the thing to keep my snot clogged head distracted from itself.

This ain't no Judy Blume, nor is it like my favorite YA author Paul Zindel. Not too juvie-centric, not too angsty, and filled with interesting trivia as well as abstract concepts.

Just yesterday morning we were driving behind a pick up truck that had one of those great Coop stickers on it. The one of the nun with a boob hanging out. Benn made a comment that maybe that wasn't legal. I was like, "What? You're crazy."

There must be something in the air, besides pollen. I've lost days, due to sickness (I think it's just supermonster allergies), lost checks (in just a walk from downstairs to upstairs), lost posts (damn you, Blogger!)and there are lost shipments even though when tracked they say they were delivered. What's going on here? Where do all these lost items go?

Though he doesn't wear the older one anymore, he says he would never consider giving it away or selling it on eBay. Even if it didn't represent 37 mostly pretty good years with the woman he met on a Hampden sidewalk.

"Even if a marriage was over, you'd think you'd want to keep it," Tom says softly. "It couldn't have been all bad."

Which is why he's holding on to the gold band from the bucket. At least until the next parade.

In Baltimore, for example, Benn Ray, the co-owner of an independent bookstore, Atomic Books, has started up a regular "I Hate the 80's" party to mock the trend.

"The 80's nostalgia was starting to roll in, and I was like, 'Wait a minute! Did you people actually listen to the same decade I did? You had eight years of Reagan. There was cocaine everywhere. There were yuppies. We were oppressed by this whole notion of baby boomers trying to cash out." At past parties, attended by people wearing parachute pants and Members Only jackets, local bands performed their most hated 80's memories on Casio keyboards, which they promptly demolished at the end of their set. "One year," he recalled, "a performer called Evil Pappy Twin played Van Halen covers on a classical Renaissance lute."

This week Mike read The Replacements - Let it Be (33 1/3) by Colin Meloy:"Colin Meloy, frontman and mastermind of the Decemberists, writes about his lifelong relationship with this Replacements album with an endearing eloquence, as he moves through the various stages of his social life and its relationship to the music he loves. Ultimately, the book is more a memoir of Meloy's time growing up in Montana than it is about Let it Be, but these accounts still manage to make clear his adoration for the album. Some of my favorite parts were his descriptions of elementary and middle school life, as he grappled for an identity amongst his peers, wanting to be a 'punk' and not a 'poser', a common trouble among those crazy kids growing up in the 80s."

Lauren read Or Else #1 by Kevin Huizenga:"I found the art in this book to be well done. Most of the panels are not very detailed but the ones with more to them are very nice. The style reminds me of Jordan Crane.

Remember Romper Room? Did you know that it started here, in Baltimore?

Remember how the host would look out from behind a Magic Mirror and call out kids' names like she could actually see them? It was kind of creepy. She never called my name.

Of course, I have a real magic mirror now. My blog logs. I can see each and every one of you.

I can see you, Plano, Texas! And you Lubbock! And Tampa and Carmel and Tokyo and Woodbridge and Redding and Foster City and Fort Bragg and Cockeysville and Maple Grove and Honolulu and Rapid City and Chicago and Ellicott City and Merrick and Montreal and Barcelona and Rye and Hunt Valley and San Francisco and Private IP Address Lan and Savannah and Brooklyn and Ithica and Athens and Cherry Hill and Shanghai and Waltham and Ile-de-France and Providence and Boston and Ann Arbor and Winnipeg and somebody in Finland and Reston and...and...and...all the boys and girls who read our blog every day right here in Baltimore.

The Minnesota Center for the Books Arts has an exhibit called Spot On: The Art of Zines and Graphic Novels, April 9th to June 25th, 2005, and they have a call for entries. Deadline is March 19th. We have fliers here at the store you can pick up with addresses and more info as well.

And closer to home, but oddly with almost the exact same dates, Philadelphia University's Design Center is putting on a zine exhibit: DIY Revolution, curated by Sean Carton.

2 women in their early 20s:
First Woman: I had no idea what was going on!
Second Woman: I didn't get it either. But don't let the boys know that or they'll explain it to us over and over and over!
First Woman: Yeah, I can't remember half the things he tells me about comics. I just tune it out.
Second Woman: Yeah, you have to.

2 women, maybe in their late 30s or early 40s (couldn't see them, just heard them):
First woman: I didn't get it.
Second woman: His movies don't make any sense anymore.
First woman: Keanu banked on the Matrix. He doesn't have to do anything good anymore.

One woman, in her forties, on her cell phone:
"You should see this movie I just saw...well, it's about good and evil...but not like you'd expect."

A few years ago, this fool walked into the store, looked around a bit, and asked me, "Have you read all of these books?"

Um, no. Yes, we're a small store, but we still have thousands of titles. There's no way I could read all of these books in my entire lifetime, let alone have read them up to now. But honestly, that was a sobering revelation. Because I am a reader. Ever since I was a kid I've always just read without a thought to an end to it, without ever thinking in practical terms of how many books there are in the world and how to find the time to read them all.

Since I'm also a book buyer, I'm searching for things other people may want to read as well as myself. Other people being mostly Benn, but still, just reading titles and author names in catalogs takes time, too. I probably read more ABOUT books than the actual books themselves.

I'm 35 years old now. I have, if I'm lucky, 2000 more books to read before I die. A pitiful amount consider…

Mike read WE3 #3 by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely:
"I was completely sold on this miniseries from the very beginning. This final installment wraps up this household-pets-turned-secret-lethal-government-experiments storyline, as the three escaped animals meet up with their creators who have been sent to take them down before they reach the city and kill everybody. Morrison is able to garner sympathy for these animals who, by this point, have torn through innumerable amounts of soldiers, civilians, and drill-headed rats. Frank Quitely's pages are full of believable action and inventive layouts. All of which make for a completely succinct and fascinating story, unlike anything I've read before."

Rachel read Fears of Your Life by Michael Bernard Loggins:
"Originally published as zines, this 2 part listing of the author's fears is now a beautifully put together little hardcover. You may have heard an excerpt read on This American Life, but reading the book (th…

Unfortunately, it's not an all ages show. The Twin Six often lose their clothes. And Chester Stacey's lead singer has been known to wear tear-away pants. Then there's Trixie Little. What a show!Update:Ok, the show IS All Ages. You lucky, lucky kids.

Photo by eatsdirt, from MC Chris' performance at The Onion Holiday Party from December. Not from the Ottobar show last night. Because I didn't bring my camera. Because I'm lame. I didn't even have my sidekick. But I saw a million cameraphones, digital cams and camcorders there so I know you're all passing them around so pass some to me.

MC Chris: "So do you all like hip hop? Even if it's by a black man?"

Um, there were a lot of people there. Not just for a Monday night. For any night. When we drove up after 9pm, there was a line out the door and down the block. (I seriously thought that maybe there had been a bomb scare or something and everyone had to stand outside.) I was informed that the line started at 8pm.